The present invention concerns a rear steering control device in particular for an automotive vehicle with four guiding wheels.
The invention concerns also an automotive vehicle equipped with such a device.
Such a device should be able to control the deflection of the rear wheels as a function of the deflection of the front wheels imparted by the steering wheel of the vehicle.
It is known that in order to obtain the best possible road behaviour of the vehicle in the conditions defined above, it is necessary to deflect the rear wheels in the same direction as the front wheels for a value of the angle of lock less than a predetermined threshold value and in the direction opposite to the front wheels when the value of the angle of lock of the steering wheel exceeds the threshold value. Therefore, a desirable oversteering effect of the vehicle is obtained when the angle of lock is relatively large, for example when the vehicle is put into a garage or a car park and an also desirable understeering effect of the vehicle is obtained when the angle of lock is relatively small as is the case when the vehicle runs relatively quickly.
A device complying with the above conditions is disclosed for example in the French Pat. No. 2,556,682.
However, this kind of device has a drawback that its geometry imposes a law of deflection that cannot be adapted to the behaviour of the vehicle according to the observations and the results of tests.